There were some (much needed) QoL changes and bug fixes queued up to go out for a standard patch in July that were accidentally merged into this last Episode release, all of which were untested and not yet ready for Live. As you can see, that's introduced some new issues while also resolving some others. It's a shame because I was super excited to finally address all of that player feedback.

The plan now is to do the originally intended QA and bug fixing internally on all of the content that was accidentally released early, and push out a patch with a batch of fixes for the content. That does take time, and I'd prefer to do it correctly as opposed to shooting out a series of reactionary hot fixes. While I can't provide a date, I can say that it'll happen as soon as possible.

I don't have much to say beyond that other than I'm horribly sorry for the inconvenience, and I personally am nauseated by the situation that was introduced.

So yes, it seems that Xera will remain disabled for a while until the internal bugfixes for the QoL changes are done.

Doesn't matter if it has become easier or harder, this goes both ways: if it's not intended, they have to fix it. And if it's intended, they have to let it clear on patch notes that they have changed their "intention" with the boss mechanic to begin with. They already give no information whatsoever regarding the mechanics and changing them after the boss is released with no patch notes lead me to believe this is completely accidental (i.e something they shouldn't be allowing to happen if they even tested things).